In 2011, The State Of Our Union Depends On Our Participation

I've been listening to President Obama give speeches since he was a State Senator from Illinois. I know he can give a great speech. For the most part, his speech was what I expected to hear. It was sad that he largely ignored climate change, completely ignored gun control and the declining middle class.

Instead he talked about an issue he knows best. Hope. Hope is a wonderful thing. It gives people a reason to continue their lives each day, to better themselves in a national environment that does so little to help the least amongst us. In fact, income inequality is at it's highest gap since the beginning of the Great Depression and Republicans in Congress are more than willing to increase it for their friends in the large industries and corporate boardrooms. Hearing Obama tout federal salary freezes and talk about lowering corporate taxes when large corporations pay next to nothing (or even receive tax refunds) is the last thing I want to hear from a Democratic President's State of the Union speech.

Of course, there were plenty of good ideas mentioned. Rewarding small businesses with big ideas (such as the company that built the contraption to help Chilean miners). Cutting the Defense Department, promoting the DREAM Act and ending tax breaks for oil companies are all items that ring well in this progressive's ears.

What is most important to me in his speech, is that we are a nation of big ideas. He is right. A big idea would be to push Obama back away from Republican talking points and their anti-government and anti-working and middle class agenda. We need to push him away from being affected by their nasty rhetoric and back to the base of the Democratic party. Making sure he stays on track with a forward thinking education system and reminding him about climate change and that unlike the mantra of the N.R.A., guns actually do kill people (and they make it far easier when bullets cost seventeen cents a piece). In order to accomplish the progressive movement's big ideas and those that will help to make our union a stronger and more effective one for the nation, we must ceaselessly and thoroughly guide the President, the Senate...and yes, even the House through the next two years so that we do not descend into the madness that a large portion of the Republican party is offering us.

Do not count on Obama to pull a miracle out of his hat for us, we must make that miracle for ourselves.

Madame Speaker, Here's Our President

I look forward to a repeat of this introduction for the next eight years:



Much, much better than having had to look at this (careful, it may scare you).

Obama's Big Night On Capitol Hill

A few years ago if I had wanted to catch the President's State of the Union (or speech to Congress, whatever you'd like to call the first Joint Address in the term) afterhours, I'd have to wait and wait and wait. Now I don't even have to find a good quality video on YouTube, all it took was a short trip to Whitehouse.gov. I also got to fast forward to the actual speech when I couldn't take anymore applauding.

As for the actual speech, it was knocked out of the park with the bases loaded. It even topped his move earlier in the day to lay out a clear path of withdrawing our troops in Iraq. The address in its entirety spoke to all Americans, and all but the hardest of hard-core Republicans overwhelmingly approved. We already knew he was good at campaign speeches, but as President they just keep getting better and better.

Unfortunately, what is not better is the economy and that was the 800 pound elephant in the room (yes, you can equate that animal inference to the party with a similar emblem). Obama didn't ignore it though, he went straight for the pachyderm and spoke with truth and honesty that even got the applause of some Republicans. Of course, their party is in disarray and whatever bright hopes of new leadership they think they have is woefully incompetent and delusional, as we saw right after Obama's speech. As a Republican from Louisiana to talk about Katrina and complain about the government is...mindblowing.

Last night, we saw the heads of both parties give their best and really, there is no comparison, whatsoever. Obama owned the night.

George's Bouncy Ball Is Full Of Lead

The State of the Union is usually a chance for a President to increase his approval ratings, with all the applause and grand ideas laid out before the Congress and the nation. The touching and heartfelt appearances by someone in the audience that is or could be affected by plan A or B is always nice icing on the cake. However this was Bush's last S.O.T.U. address and hardly anyone likes him, so could this be his last chance to win some people over?

Nope:

The dour public mood seems to chiefly reflect distress over the doddering economy, which has seen job cuts, financial market slides and real estate losses stoke recession fears. Bush's approval for handling the economy dove to 29 percent, a slide of 4 percentage points in a month and matching his low on that issue, with noticeable slumps among middle-income people, Southerners and city residents.[...]

Yet Bush's acceptance by his own party is at bottom in the AP-Ipsos poll. Just 61 percent of Republicans gave Bush positive reviews; his previous low was 65 percent last month. Only 28 percent of them expressed strong approval.

About one in 10 Democrats and three in 10 independents gave Bush positive marks.

Wow one in ten Democrats approve? Who are these people and what rocks do they live under?

Durbin Weighs The Good And Bad Of The S.O.T.U.

Of course you know which side of the scale tips before you click the play button:

Perino Tries To Clean Up Bush's SotU Mess

Even though she is clearly incapable of what her job entails, I feel bad for Dana Perino sometimes. Sometimes. Bush puts out a lot of garbage and her job is to sweep it into neat little piles after he speaks for the press. On any average day it is hard enough to be simultaneously clueless and White House Press Secretary, but on the day of the State of the Union (but after the speech in print form has been handed out) is just overwhelming. I'll pick out some items below, but definitely read through the transcript if you have time.

From The White House:

On Earmarks:

Q So on the earmarks, he said at the end of last year that he was directing OMB to look and see what they could do to reduce the earmarks that Congress had passed last year. You suggested the thing that he's doing tonight, or announcing tonight in the State of the Union, addresses future earmarks. What happened to the plan to tackle earmarks last year?

MS. PERINO: The President decided that he needed to give the Congress a very clear indication of what he was going to do. Last year he called on Congress to voluntarily cut the number of earmarks in half; they did not do that. The President will not go retrospectively back to the earmarks that were in the omnibus, but he will take this action for 2009 appropriations.

Remember, an executive order remains in place unless a future President decides to rescind it or change it. So we think this is a good, solid action, and it's a good way to do business, in terms of signaling exactly to Congress what you plan to do and then taking further action if they -- since they didn't voluntarily reduce the number of earmarks.

Q But what happens -- what was the plan, then, to deal with all the earmarks from last year?

MS. PERINO: As I said, I --

Q Are they still up in the air or --

Q Or are you just going to let them go?

MS. PERINO: We're not going to -- there's no further action on them.

Q Oh, so he's dropping that, what he said.

Q In other words, fiscal '08 appropriations (inaudible) and the application applies for the first time to fiscal '09 appropriations?

MS. PERINO: Peter.

Oh Peter, you know better than ask silly questions that make the President look like a complete hypocrite that he is. I won't bother with this utter silliness.

On the President's legacy:

Q You said it's the final State of the Union. Is it, in a way, an attempt to shape the legacy? And in what way, if it is?

MS. PERINO: No, I think it's -- I can understand why many people, especially those that cover the President in the press could see that the President would approach this as his legacy speech, but no, not at all; this is a very forward-looking speech. The President doesn't spend a lot of time thinking about that. Look, the President thinks his legacy will shake itself out when people look at the record, and history will tell.

Ha, history is already deciding on that.

On the state of the union now versus seven years ago:

Q Is the country better off --

MS. PERINO: The what?

Q Is the country better off now than seven years ago?

MS. PERINO: Certainly seven years ago -- well, seven years ago, right before September 11th, I think that people would say that the country certainly felt better off. There's been -- once we were confronted with terrorists who would fly jumbo jets into buildings and kill thousands of our citizens in an instant, it created a sense of fear and nervousness about our security. And that's why the President decided to take on the terrorists head on and go on the offense.

And we have done that around the world. We have been successful so far in preventing another attack on our country. But it's not for their lack of trying. And that's another reason why the President -- tonight you'll hear him call on Congress to pass the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act reauthorization. They have until Friday to do that, and the President sees no reason why they shouldn't be able to get that done.

So um, that would be no I'm assuming? Like I said before, I really do feel sorry for her, sometimes.

Chris Shays Hearts George Bush

I knew he loved the man in an innocent political way, but obviously the relationship goes deeper than I thought.

The Mis-Statements Of The Union

The State of the Union is the one time of year that the President gets to go up on stage in the House of Representatives and address both Houses of Congress, his Cabinet and the Justices of the Supreme Court. Everyone gets to come except for one member of the Cabinet just in case something were to happen, but it doesn't unless you believe in the imagination of Tom Clancy. It is known as the political Academy Awards and everyone in the Washingtonian world pays attention.

I of course tried to as well, but for some reason my Internet went down from the hours of 9:10pm and about 8:30 this morning, so I didn't get to see it live. I was able to read highlights from my Treo and my Mom graciously let me listen to Kathleen Sebelius over the phone as she gave the Democratic response. It isn't too big a deal that I missed it, since we all kind of knew what he would say anyways.

Thankfully it was the last time we will have to hear his lies at the State of the Union. And boy oh boy were there quite a few whoppers. The hard workers at ThinkProgress catalogued each lie and followed it up with the facts from reality, as opposed to the delusions in George Bush's head. He lied about everything from progress (or lack of it) in Iraq, to disaster relief in New Orleans, climate change agreements and the false promise of Health Savings Accounts. The speech highlights how remarkable a disaster his Presidency has been....thankfully it is less than a year from being over.

"Totally Out Of Touch"

Senator Biden hits the nail on the head after seeing the disgrace that was George Bush's last State of the Union:

Heroes In The Audience Tonight, To Bush, They're Zeroes

For the third time, Marvin Bethea will be in the audience for George Bush's State of the Union address. Thankfully to him, it will be George's last. Bethea was a paramedic based in Queens when he rushed Ground Zero to help people in one of our nation's worst disasters. Now he is taking several medications a day and is sick and tired of how the President neglects him and all the 9/11 responders who have become ill after breathing the toxic air of Lower Manhattan following the collapse of the Twin Towers.

From The Daily News:

"I'm fed up with how we're treated," said Bethea, saying he now takes 12 medications daily and still has trouble getting adequate health care. "They went from calling us heroes to treating us like zeros."

Ground Zero volunteer John Feal was even more blunt in skewering the White House.

"You got $3 billion a month to kill people," Feal said. "You got $3 billion a year for health care."

On the eve of Bush's speech, 9/11 responders, union leaders and elected officials gathered at Ground Zero Sunday to blast the White House for recently yanking a contract for ailing 9/11-responder care.

"They just don't want to spend the money," said Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-Manhattan), whose district includes Ground Zero. "They'd rather see these people die."

The apathy of the White House is sad, but unfortunately true. Bush loved to use the true heroes of 9/11 for his own quest for war but now that they need his help he refuses to give it. He rejected spending extensions for clinics that care for the rescue workers. Tonight, when he talks about what he wants Congress to pass, perhaps he could change his mind about people like Marvin Bethea and John Feal, but we already know he won't.

He Lied To Us Last Year

He's lied to us in every other State of the Union.....



So why should we believe him this time?

Bush's Environmental Delusions Versus Reality

During the State of the Union (Bush's last, hooray!) the President is going to lie over and over again, but thanks to organizations like the Center for American Progress, we'll know what to look out for:

Bush Gives The State Of The Union

If Bush would have wrote it himself instead of being the 'editor-in-chief,' this would have been it.